Brewing Unique Experiences

Braxton Brewing Co. will soon open its newest facility to enjoy a cold beer. The Braxton Barrel House is set to open this fall in a corner of the former Remke grocery store on Dixie Highway in Fort Mitchell.

The new facility, Braxton’s third location, will celebrate craft bourbon barrel beer with a barrel-aging brewery and taproom, says Mitch Barnhill, head of marketing. The taproom will include as many as 20 draft beers, along with an outdoor patio, he says. In addition, a 20,000-square-foot storage facility will be located below the taproom to house bourbon and other types of barrels for aging beer.

“It’s going to be a really nice addition to Fort Mitchell, something that is … very different from our other locations,” says Barnhill. “We want to keep providing those unique experiences.”

Providing guests with a one-of-a-kind experience has been the goal of Braxton Brewing Co. since it first opened its original brewery and taproom in Covington in 2015. One of a kind is a great way to describe the impetus behind the brand—Evan Rouse.

Rouse fell in love with brewing beer as a kid and he built a home brewery in the family garage on Braxton Drive in Union, Kentucky, when he was just 16 years old, says Barnhill. “It started in the garage, it’s where the family would gather and it’s where the brewery really started,” he says.

Now the entire Rouse family is involved in the business and the company has continued to grow since its humble beginnings. Following the opening of the brewery and taproom in Covington, Braxton Brewing Co. opened the Braxton Labs brewery and taproom inside the Party Source store in Bellevue in 2017.

It’s here that Braxton experiments with different styles, flavors and ingredients in beer, says Barnhill. “Like, right now, we have a raspberry white stout on, which doesn’t look like a stout at all but tastes like one,” he says. “We’re here to try all sorts of different things.”

Barnhill says right now Braxton has about 30 different beers on draft, in addition to several seasonal beers. “There’s always going to be seasonals that come and go,” he says. “So while there may be 10 more styles that come up, they’ll be gone fairly quickly. They’re pretty popular.”

One of the most popular beers in the fall is Oktober Fuel. “It’s just a very strong Oktoberfest lager,” he says. Another seasonal favorite that people really love in the fall is Graeter’s Pumpkin Pie, says Barnhill.

In addition to beer, Braxton also produces a hard seltzer called Vive. “We started creating that a year and half ago and it took us about a year to get it exactly right,” says Barnhill.

Since then, Braxton has partnered with FC Cincinnati as the official beer and official hard seltzer of the soccer team. Braxton is also the official hard seltzer of the Cincinnati Bengals.